CharlotteCooper.net - Travel

New York 1.12.94
Jeffrey Dahmer beaten to death.
Jerry Rubin died.
Notice on Times Square Billboard: Fighting in the suburbs after a severed pigs head was thrown through the window of a Jewish family.

We were a bit early but we found the studios for Sally Jessy without much bother. We went and checked in to get a seat number. The receptionist remarked upon our Englishness and gave us VIP tickets. We were laughing! We waited in the corridor with the rest of the audience, checking each other out. Lots of permed hair.

We walked through to the studio. A woman saw our VIP tickets and asked what made us VIPs. I said "We come from London" and that set everybody off. Everyone was making a fuss of our accents and saying "I'll have a cup of tea please" in posh English voices.

We went into the studio and were re-seated several times. I didn't think anything of it but Simon reckons it was because the producer saw us and didn't think we'd make a very lively audience. It took ages to seat everyone and eventually we were plonked at the side out of view of any cameras.

We stayed for only one show, and that was enough! Totally outrageous family feud, with poor white folk ready to tear out each other's throats.

Sally Jessy was humourless, totally synthetic. During the commercial breaks she sipped water through a straw from a special glass with "Sally" etched on the side whilst make-up and wardrobe staff attended to her.

If the studio family feudsters were unpleasant, then the programme producers were even worse. One of the participant's daughters was in the audience crying and Simon heard someone saying "I didn't notice the bit about the child crying in the script".

The family kissed and made up for Xmas in 50 minutes (including commercial breaks). We were blown away.

We came out into the midday sun and walked around Columbus, through the Lincoln Centre, and into Central Park, where we saw some children playing baseball.

Knoxville, Tennessee 9.12.94
Walking back from the launderette last night we passed a child screaming and hitting a white man who was leaning into his car. We could see the man's arm flailing over another small figure in the backseat. It was a terrible scene. The girl child outside was wearing a party dress. We were both so stunned about what we had seen that we just kept walking. I felt powerless, but I wanted to do something. How could a man hit a child like that?

We dumped our bags and walked back down the road, expecting them all to have driven away. They were still there. What to do? The children looked upset. They were half crying, and the boy (from inside the car) was now on the pavement holding his arm. What could we do? We could have been misreading the situation. But we saw the man hitting the child.

Got back to the hotel and called the social service's child abuse line. I gave them the car registration number and told them what we'd seen. They said they'd check it out. It felt weird reporting it. I didn't want to call the police because I didn't think they'd be particularly sensitive (especially after the round-up the other night when they arrested a load of black kids who were having a party at the hotel), I just wanted to report what I'd seen and to be taken seriously. I still felt that I was snitching, even though I totally identified with the children. I come from a culture that would have made excuses for the man and assumptions that he had his reasons for behaving like that. It felt strange to treat it all with such solemnity and not brush it off, or not walk on. I did wonder whether the abuse line was a front for some awful family values religious group. I did what I thought was best.

Only minutes before, we had been laughing at all the varieties of chewing gum in Revco. After we'd told people about the incident, two said "Welcome to America," the hotel receptionist, and the abuse line worker.